#ogl 1.2

[dungeonmastersconsortium]

I'M TENTATIVELY FUCKING STOKED AT THE OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENT

[tabletop-rpgs]

New OGL 1.2 revealed

On the surface it looks better but still has some tricky issues that people may overlook

Here is a Reddit discussion thread LINK

New OGL LINK

[leidensygdom]

D&D Beyond on Twitter

“Over the past few weeks you, the community, have made your voices heard. And we’ve listened. OGL 1.0a will remain untouched AND the entire SRD 5.1 is now available under a Creative Commons license.🧵 https://t.co/hJTm2Rgruo”

[Image ID: A tweet by D&D Beyond (blue checkmark) @/DndBeyond, posted during January 27, that reads: Your feedback in the OGL 1.2 survey is already clear and we are acting on it:

-62% are satisfied with adding the SRD to Creative Commons & those dissatisfied want more in CC

-89% are dissatisfied with deauthorizing OGL 1.0a

-88% do not want to publish content under OGL 1.2. End ID]

Well! This was just posted. The overwhelming negative feedback about the new OGL, people making their voices heard, third parties cutting ties with WOTC and moving to other places (including the competition) as well as the boycotting seem to have given some results. 

I am posting this very shortly after the announcement, so I am currently unaware if there may be some secret caveat here (Pardon me for being overly wary, WOTC has made a lot of shady moves lately), but this sounds quite promising. (Let’s remember the OGL 1.0a was irrevocable to start with, so there’s no need to paint them as saviours for not doing something that was probably illegal, but...) All in all, the community made it clear the new OGL was bad, and WOTC lost the trust of quite a lot of people on the way. I don’t think they will completely recover their image from this, as they’ve shown what they’re truly after, but this is a good backstep still.

(For the record, OneDnD may be based on a different OGL. This is fine. If they do, they may just repeat what happened with 4e if it’s particularly bad.)

I’ll keep updating if something comes up about this announcement. I want to tell everyone a massive thank you for keeping up with me during all the OGL talk, and for people to have voiced and pushed against the new OGL, for participating in the surveys and partaking in the boycott. All of that has been crucial to make our voices heard- And as a creator, it’s reassuring to see this is finally looking better.

[cryptid-peanut]

Path of the Agitator Barbarian! This barbarians indignant rage inspires others to action using offensive teamwork! This was made as my personal celebration of our successful protest against the removal of the OGL. I’m used to making complex subclasses so I tried to make a simpler class, let me know if you have any feedback, I’d really appreciate it! 

[abislwise]

HOLY SHIT, WE WON https://www.dndbeyond.com/posts/1439-ogl-1-0a-creative-commons

[sleepy-skelington]

ok so even WotC/Hasbro investors know shits going down. goddamn

[judiciousimprecation]

OGL 1.2 thoughts

WotC released their (actually a draft this time!!) OGL 1.2 today and I have some thoughts.

tl;dr I think it’s really good; releasing core mechanics under CC-BY is a massive (if hand-forced) olive branch, and I’m cautiously optimistic that if they’re willing to change course this hard, they’ll listen to feedback about the remaining points of contention as well.

SRD Intro

CREATIVE!! COMMONS!! This is literally what tons of people were screaming for (including myself) and I can’t go moving my goal posts too much. And to emphasize, this is all D&D core game mechanics released under CC-BY which is the most permissive CC license. Literally the only obligation/restriction is that you have to give attribution/credit.

OGL 1.0a Deauthorization - Still not great, but I think taken in context of the CC stuff plus what the new OGL looks like, it’s much less of a concern by itself. This is one area where WotC really shot themselves in the foot with the leak; without the context of the last two (three?) weeks this bit would be wayyy less contentious.

OGL 1.2

One thing that’s curiously missing/different here is the removal of the “Open Game Content” concept; the license doesn’t (seem to?) provide a straightforward way for 3PP to tack their own content on to the license and thus pass it on under the same terms.

IRREVOCABLE! Take a drink. This plus the (almost) No Modifications bit (below) is another big safety net.

No license back provision - They promised this and I think they delivered on it as best they can. The “only monetary no injunctive” bit is interesting and I think a clever compromise; If you think WotC stole your content you have to prove they did it intentionally, and you can only sue for money (you can’t stop them/hold their work hostage in the meantime). Given how much “worrying about users suing us for seemingly stealing their ideas” is a concern for literally every game/creative company out there (see: why companies automatically trash every copyright-able suggestion you send them), this is and understandable provision and actually a pretty a decent compromise that I have a hard time reading malice into.

Modification - 7a is basically saying they can’t change anything meaningful except a) how they can be attributed and b) how they can contact you, which they clearly explain is to leave room for future technological changes. Nothing else changes, so the license is well and properly permanent/irrevocable.

Termination - My main beef with the 1.2 license is here in the bit “We may immediately terminate your license if you... violate Section 6(f)” and 6f reads “You will not t include content... or engage in conduct that is harmful, discriminatory, [etc etc]. We... decide what conduct or content is hateful, and you... will not contest any such determination.” Even a layman can see this has a loophole big enough to drive a truck through. WotC can point to anything you do or say as hateful and revoke your OGL privileges with zero notice and you can’t even contest their judgement. This part really needs to be changed, but I also think it probably will be refined/improved somehow because a lot of people are going to have the same feedback.

VTT Policy

First off, this is very very clearly marked as like “extra double wip draft feedback requested” so I’m reserving judgement for the most part (Imagine if they’d done that with the first leak!)

Mostly it seems to be aimed in the right direction. “Using VTTs to replicate the experience of sitting around the table playing D&D with your friends.” seems like a decent baseline, although it leaves a lot of ambiguity about how different content can interact. Calling out animations as not permitted is a miss I think; there’s a couple very popular existing modules that explicitly add animation for 5e spells and actions.

The VTT policy leaves a lot of open questions and ambiguity but this whole page is better thought of as a statement of intent and a draft of a draft than real rules atm.

Conclusion

Overall I think this is a massive step in the right direction with only a few more much smaller steps to go, and I’m cautiously optimistic that they can take it to the finish line. Open-sourcing the core mechanics of the SRD is a huge win by itself, even if nothing else changes. (Yes the argument can be made that the core D&D mechanics were never copyrightable in the first place but go post some youtube videos that make Fair Use of Paramount movie clips and tell me how useful a theoretical legal defense is when a billion dollar company wants you to shut up. CC-BY means creators can sleep peacefully at night). VTT policy has the most room to screw things up but given their approach so far I’m not worrying yet.

[amummy]

If ya’ll haven’t seen it yet!

https://gizmodo.com/dungeons-dragons-will-no-longer-deauthorize-its-open-1850041837?rev=1674849859537